As with most unwanted consumer products, unwanted electrical and electronic equipment eventually finds its way into municipal waste stations for disposal. Until recently, the most common method of disposal was to simply bury the waste electrical and electronic equipment (commonly referred to as “WEEE” or “e-waste”) in land-fill sites. However, with increased environmental awareness, there are growing concerns about disposing WEEE in this manner. For example, in the 1990's some European countries introduced laws banning the disposal of WEEE in land-fills.
With the trend of banning the disposal of WEEE in land-fill sites expected to expand in the future, new techniques for disposing of the waste will need to be developed. If disposed of correctly, WEEE can provide a valuable source of secondary raw materials. For example, common components of WEEE include numerous types of plastic and elements such as lead, tin, copper, silicon, beryllium, carbon, iron, aluminium, cadmium, mercury, thallium, americium, antimony, arsenic, barium, bismuth, boron, cobalt, europium, gallium, germanium, gold, indium, lithium, manganese, nickel, niobium, palladium, platinum, rhodium, ruthenium, selenium, silver, tantalum, terbium, thorium, titanium, vanadium, and yttrium. However, if not disposed of correctly (e.g. in land-fill), the common components of WEEE can present a major source of toxins and carcinogens.
Due to their often complex and multi-component structures, disposing or recycling WEEE in a safe, efficient and effective manner has to date proven difficult. One approach that has been used involves shredding the WEEE and using sophisticated equipment to separate the various metal and plastic components. The separated components are then on sold to metal and plastic recyclers. However, the equipment required to separate the complex mixture of shredded components is very expensive. Furthermore, the separation process is far from perfect, which in turn limits applications for the “separated” materials.
An opportunity therefore remains to address or ameliorate one or more disadvantages or shortcomings associated with existing methods for disposing WEEE, or to at least provide a useful alternative method.